Painting Better Stone Work

[Bravo Six]

Over the years I've been doing most of my rocks and stone using the following recipe (mainly craft acrylic colors)

- Base of DecoArt Americana Neutral Grey and Black Mix (similar to the old GW charcoal color I can't remember the name of at the moment.
- DecoArt Americana Neutral Grey drybrush
- FolkArt Medium Grey drybrush
- FolkArt Dove Grey final light drybrush.

This has served me well for small rock clumps and rocks on bases because it's dramatic and deep with it's dark base, however I think it's too dark for things like statuary, stone walls and stonework on buildings. I need a lighter base coat to start.

Anyway, does anyone have a lighter stone recipe they'd care to share that gives the results you think maybe I'm after? 

[Blackwolf]

Your colours look pretty good Add a little white,and a good trick is to use some complementary colours; a couple of drops of dark blue to your shades,and on your highlights a bit of orange shaded beige brown,just to warm it up. And perhaps an olive green for lichen/moss  et cetera , this will complement both your blue and your highlights 

[Bravo Six]

Thanks Guy! Much appreciated.

This is an example of how my current palette looks:



And this is more what I want to achieve, lightness wise (though that print is pretty awful):

[Blackwolf]

They look pretty darn good to me! Perhaps on the stonework on the bottom one a little grime on the lower bricks, a little green and red very thinned to denote oxides and moss,that sort of thing. Really they’re top notch,and I overthink 

[Bravo Six]

Just to be clear..... I didn't paint the lower pic, only the top.

But yes.... I tend to overthink too as well Guy. Thanks so much for your thumbs up.

[Blackwolf]

Oh dear,didn’t read everything properly     I think your idol is the better of the two.

[Bravo Six]

I think your idol is the better of the two

Thank you kind sir. Much appreciated! I do tend to second guess my handiwork from time to time.

[SotF]

For stone, a lot of it depends upon what you want.

Recently, one thing that I've been doing for a "white" stone that has bits of different colors is to start with a medium grey prime, then I do something that feels like a dive off the deep end and base coat with a lot of bright colors and browns to have a rather garish, mottled look over most of the stonework, leaving some details without any which gets a drybrush of a light grey over it. Then I go with a black ink wash over it and start with drybrushes. I tend to use both a warm and cold off white/very light grey for some relatively heavy drybrushes. Then a second black ink wash, this one slightly tinted by a little bit of a brown ink. Then a lighter second drybrush of both off whites, and then I hit the brighter details that didn't get the color base coat along with places that would have the highest light a very light drybrush of pure white.

For the mottled color, I've used reds, blues, greens, browns, purples, with a few darker yellows. Bright yellows and most oranges don't work well for it.

Depending upon how far you go with the drybrushes you can get things from this...



to this...



to this...

[Bravo Six]

Thanks SotF. The bridge at the bottom has a look I'd like to achieve for my large Buddha aquarium piece and stone Japanese lanterns. I'd never have thought by using different colors on grey would be so "not noticeable". There's a couple of grey spray primers from Vallejo I've considered try as my base coat instead to see what happens.

[SotF]

Thanks SotF. The bridge at the bottom has a look I'd like to achieve for my large Buddha aquarium piece and stone Japanese lanterns. I'd never have thought by using different colors on grey would be so "not noticeable". There's a couple of grey spray primers from Vallejo I've considered try as my base coat instead to see what happens.

It's mainly that you start with it, and it will look horrible at first when you get the colors on, but it just gets better and better as you work towards the end color.

[Bravo Six]

Perfect! Thanks!

Different kind of stone, but ages ago I was looking for a sandstone style painting guide for my village church for my British Horror project and came across this useful, and simple, paint guide:

https://minimonsters.eu/en_US/n/7

[snitcythedog]

My recipe for regular rocks is prime black.  Highlight of red brown, highlight of khaki then inks. 

Same on a building.

If I am looking to make the rock the focal point it is prime black, highlight dark gray, highlight red brown, highlight khaki, lots of thinned inks and another light highlight of khaki and thin washes of green. Here is an example of a rock as a focal point.

[MaleGriffin]

Exceptionally nice brushwork on the stone! It looks absolutely real!

[Bravo Six]

Long after this was posted, I finally tweaked my current recipe and went with a much lighter (but still dark) base coast. It's a pewter colored craft paint with just a wee bit of black for the base coat. Then drybrushed with a mix of my standard color palette and I'm extremely happy with the results.

This is the resin Cthulhu statue from Reaper.

[Cacique Caribe]

I really want to give this color scheme a try with my jungle ruins.
Dan